First Light Readings

The Nature of Thingsby Michael Barakiva

Nov 11th | Tue | @ 7pm

Lucretius may not appear to be anyone special in Rome, circa 55 BC. He’s the sonof a freed slave and he works in a tavern to pay for school. But he willdo what he must to gain respect and win the heart of the boy of hisdreams, even if that means coming up with a theory of the nature ofeverything. A modern play about ancient times.

ParadiseBy Laura Maria Censabella

Nov 14th | Fri | @ 7pm

A Yemeni-American girl with a secret. A disgraced scientist forced toteach in the public schools. Eternal questions about love. What is theformula to Paradise here on this earth?

The Elementary Space Time ShowA musical by César Alvarez

Nov 18th | Tue | @ 3pm

A disillusioned teenager named Alameda finds herself trapped in a cosmicvaudevillian game show. By confronting avatars of scientific truth,ostentatious musical numbers, and inappropriate dance sequences, Alamedaacquaints herself with the enigmatic laws of the Universe. A story ofhow a hard shell of hopelessness might be cracked open by awe.

The Mermaid HourBy David Valdes Greenwood

Nov 20th | Thu | @ 7pm

Working class parents Pilar and Bird scramble to keep up with their impulsivetransgender daughter Vi, who’s angling to start puberty-blockingtreatments. When she posts a video of her story on the internet, itforces Pilar and Bird to question what it means to be "good parents" inthe face of the unknown.

Where Ever it May BeA musical by Matt Schatz

Nov 24th | Mon | @ 7pm

Hugh Everett III’s “Many Worlds Theory of Quantum Mechanics” proposes aninfinite number of universes, where everything that could have happenedin our past, but did not, has occurred in some other universe. Everettdied in 1982, his wife Nancy in 1998. But in other universes, they arealive and well. In other universes, they are merely alive. Or at leastone of them is. This is their story.

Ruthby Alexander Borinsky

Dec 4th | Thu | @ 7pm

How can you model the currents that shape a life? In the early 50s inBoston, in the shadow of Norbert Wiener, a father remarries, a brothergets in trouble, and Danny sorts inputs from outputs, pitches fromcatches, cybernetics from baseball.

Chatterbotsby Olivia Dufault

Dec 11th | Thu | @ 7pm

Each year Hugh Loebner awards the Loebner Prize: $100,000 to the creator ofthe first artificial intelligence that can convincingly pass as human.For 16 years he has held the competition; for 16 years it has been aspectacular failure. But this year is different because, for the firsttime, there is the potential for a machine that's just as human as you,or me, or Hugh Loebner himself.